Credits

Authors: John Arcadian,

Walt Ciechanowski, Phil Vecchione
Publisher: Martin Ralya
Editor: Martin Ralya
Art Director: John Arcadian
Graphic Designer: Darren Hardy
Layout: Darren Hardy
Cover Artist: Juan Ochoa
Cover Designer: Darren Hardy
Interior Artists: John Arcadian,
David L. Johnson, Avery Liell-Kok,
Matt Morrow, Elizabeth Porter
Indexer: Martin Ralya
Proofreaders: Robert M. Everson,
Daniel Milne
Capitalist Tool: Kurt Schneider

enginepublishing.com
PO Box 571992
Murray, UT 84157
Focal Point: The Complete Game Masters
Guide to Running Extraordinary Sessions
is copyright 2015 by John Arcadian,
Walt Ciechanowski, and Phil Vecchione, all
rights reserved, and is published by Engine
Publishing, LLC with permission.
All artwork is copyright 2015 by
Engine Publishing, LLC, all rights reserved.
Engine Publishing, the Engine Publishing logo,
and the truncated gear device are trademarks
of Engine Publishing, LLC.
Gnome Stew, The Game Mastering Blog,
and the Gnome Stew logo are
trademarks of Martin Ralya.
Mention of , , or TM products and services
is not intended as a challenge to those rights
or marks, or to their holders. All such products
and services are the property of their
respective owners.
The Engine Publishing logo was
designed by Darren Hardy.
Published by Engine Publishing, LLC
in July 2015.

In memory of Aaron Allston, who taught us how to create amazing worlds, and
Robin Williams, who showed us how to bring them to life.
A special thanks to John Stavropoulos for his insight and feedback on the draft
of Chapter 15: Safety on the Set. Thank you for helping me understand the
complexity of such an important topic, and to find the right words to convey it
clearly. Phil Vecchione

Dedications
For Paula - Who was not in my life for my previous book dedications,
but who will be in my life for all of the rest. John Arcadian
To my father-in-law, Col. Richard Poch, who always
encouraged me to reach for the skies. Walt Ciechanowski
A special thanks to Martin Ralya, who started this whole thing years ago
when he took a leap of faith with us and asked us to write with him,
first on Gnome Stew and later at Engine Publishing. Phil Vecchione

Credits, Legal, and Dedication

Contents
Foreword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
How to Use this Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

Lights...

........................................................................

10

Chapter 1: The Studio . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Chapter 2: The Set . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
Chapter 3: Special Effects Scenes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Chapter 4: The Props Master . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Chapter 5: Green Screens and CGI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
Chapter 6: The Soundtrack. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67

Camera...

...................................................................

77

Chapter 7: It Starts With a Script . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78

Chapter 8: Preparing the Shoot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
Chapter 9: And... Action! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
Chapter 10: Keep Filming! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
Chapter 11: Lunch Break . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
Chapter 12: The Final Shoot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
Chapter 13: Thats a Wrap! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148

Action!

.......................................................................

155

Chapter 14: Quiet on the Set . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156

Chapter 15: Safety on the Set . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166
Chapter 16: Playing Company . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178
Chapter 17: Improvising Lines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
Chapter 18: Permits and Regulations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198
Chapter 19: Film Crew . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
About the Artwork . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .221
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223
Contributor Bios . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 228
Table of Contents

How to Use this Book

FOCAL POINT: The Complete Game Masters Guide to Extraordinary Sessions highlights
the most common activities involved in running a game, categorizes them by role
entertainer, storyteller, and facilitatorand provides techniques and advice to improve in those areas. Its intended to be read away from the table, reflected upon, and
acted on later, during sessions.
As in Never Unprepared and Odyssey, in Focal Point well break each role down into
discrete activities and then deconstruct those activities to understand why theyre
important and to explore the various ways to accomplish them well. Focal Point is
complemented by Never Unprepared or Odyssey, but you dont need those books in
order to take full advantage of this oneits designed to stand on its own as a resource
for running extraordinary sessions.

Why a Book about Running Game Sessions?

GMing is a craft that benefits from constant improvement. Whether its a new GM
just trying to run a session without panicking or a grizzled veteran working to master
a specific aspect of the craft, no one gets better at GMing by accident. And at the
table, during play, is where all that hard work pays offwhen youre actually running
sessions.
Play is the focal point of roleplaying, and by extension its also the focus of GMing.
We believe this topic more than merits a book all to itself, so we wrote one. In so
doing, we tried to capture the universal elements of GMingthe things which, no
matter what style of game or particular system you run, are common to virtually every
GM and virtually every game.
While its impossible to document the multitude of activities a GM must manage
while running a game, Focal Point sets out to define and describe the major activities
that we all perform. The most common tasks that a GM performs break down into
three major areas, or roles: entertainer, storyteller, and facilitator.

The Three Roles

Being a GM requires constant mental juggling. During the course of running a game,
you must balance a multitude of game elements while monitoring the status of your
players and making real-time adjustments to the game and/or story, all the while being entertaining and engaging. Its a job for the ambitious.
Understanding the three key roles involved in GMing is critical to getting the most
out of Focal Point, so lets look at each of them in turn.

How to Use this Book

Entertainer
As the entertainer, the GM takes on the voices and mannerisms of multiple
NPCs. She uses interesting maps and miniatures during combat. She creates
props to hand out and playlists to help set the mood of the game. The entertainer gets everyone into the game, helping them immerse themselves in their roles.
The entertainer represents the parts of the GM that are projected outward to
the players: the voices you use, the props you employ, and the soundtracks you
play. A strong entertainer is captivating to watch and enhances the story and the
game through their contributions.

Storyteller
In his role as storyteller, the GM doesnt literally tell his players a storybut he does
tell stories during the game. Some GMs create the framework of an engaging story
and then hook the group into the plot, making adjustments, often on the fly, as the
players actions create unexpected and exciting changes. Other GMs tell small stories in the moment, when they introduce a new NPC or location, but dont come to
the table with a plotted adventure for each session. But all GMs are storytellers in one
or more ways (just not in the sense that they dictate stories to their players).
This role encompasses the elements of GMing which are involved in facilitating the
collective story that the group tells at the table: the creation of dramatic tension in a
horror adventure, aggressive scene cutting to bring about a frantic pace, and the ability to quickly move a scene back into the path of the player characters (PC) if they
passed it by. A strong storyteller creates tension, making hearts pound with anticipation, and helps to create drama that can move people to tears.

Facilitator
As facilitator, the GM creates a safe environment in which everyone in the group can
let down their guard and relax their inhibitions. She helps to create harmony at the
table, and she eliminates distractions. When there is confl ict she helps to bring it to
resolution. She softens the loudest voices and raises up the quietest ones. The facilitator helps to bring the group together to make it more than the sum of its parts.
The facilitator role involves everything that helps to keep the table focused on the
game: managing the rules, resolving confl icts that arise, and helping the group to collaborate. A strong facilitator creates a strong table of players who work well together
and help each other have a memorable experience.

Three Sections and a Metaphor

In keeping with the division of GMing into three roles, weve divided Focal Point
into three sections, one for each role. Weve used the metaphor of moviemaking as a
framing device, both in the division into sections and throughout the book, because
it offers some excellent parallels to game mastering.
How to Use this Book

Scouting the Location

In movie-making terminology, scouting a location is the act of finding the perfect place to shoot a scene. For our purposes, it is determining what space is best
for you to play your game. You wont always have the perfect space, but if you
try to find a space that eliminates as many issues as possible youll have a much
better gaming experience.
There are a slew of questions you can ask yourself when scouting for the best
location possible:

What is my dream space like?If you had phenomenal cosmic powers

or all the money and tech of Tony Stark or Bruce Wayne at your disposal,
what would your ultimate play space be like? Take a few minutes to dream
about it. Think of the challenges you have in your games and what kinds
of solutions the space could provide. Figure out your ultimate play space
and then work backwards from there to more realistic options, noting the
underlying ideas that are most important to you.
What elements benet the game Im going to run?Having the
ultimate no-holds-barred play space is one thing, but how can your play
area benefit the specific game youre about to run? Do you need a big table
for miniatures and scenery? Would a few chairs in a circle help your players
interact with each other and roleplay? Would the basement actually be a
more atmospheric play space for a dungeon crawl than the living room?
Focus your thoughts on the game youre running and determine what
works best for that specific game.
Is the space a place where you can be comfortable acting?Is the space
too public? Are the other people there making you feel embarrassed
when you stand up to swing your imaginary broadsword? Being able to
be unrestrained in a gaming space is incredibly important. Some people
like performing for an audience, though; for them, a public space can be
a benefit.
What is the best space we actually have access to?All other questions
aside, what space do you actually have available to you? Gaming anywhere
is better than gaming nowhere. If the space you have available to you is
mediocre, maybe one of the players would be willing to host the game or
a better space might be available at the local game store.
How can I make the space I have access to more viable for gaming?If
youve found the best space available to you, what can you do to make it
work better? Can you bring in a new table or change the wall decorations?
What about the simple act of changing where people sit to emphasize
character connections? Look at what youve got and see what you can do
to make it better for your game.

The Studio

13

Stage Design 3: Raise The Stage

Materials Needed:
Whiteboard or dry-erase panels approximately 2 x 2
Option 1Aluminum pizza stands and one roll of duct tape
Option 2One furring strip of wood approximately 8 long by 1 tall
by 4 wide cut into two sections (a 2 long section and a 1 4 section),
and 2-4 small screws

Lets set aside the movie set analogy for a moment and think about stages for live
theater. All stages have one thing in common: They are higher than the area around
them. That small distinction puts them in a physically different space, and its a great
psychological trick that we can make use of for gaming.
This is an incredibly easy build
with some impressive results.
Start by going to a home improvement store to find dryerase (whiteboard) wall panels. These generally cost about
$5 for a 2x2 panel or $10 for
a 2x4 panel, depending on
what the store stocks. One
side is covered in a dry-erase
paint that is perfect for gaming. The other side is usually
dark brown, and you can add
a grid for miniatures to that
side with a silver permanent
marker. This gives you a twoside mapping surfacenow to raise it up off the table.
There are two simple ways to raise this set:

Metal pizza standsThese are metal brackets about 6 or 7 inches high

that restaurants use to hold pizzas. Theyre cheap and can be taped to the
dry-erase panels for stability. Using two at the edges of a 2x2 panel will raise
your set while also creating a space underneath for books and kipple.
WoodGet an 8 furring strip cut into three pieces (two 2, one 1 10) and
screw them together in an H shape. Set your dry-erase panel on top of this
frame to raise your set above the table. It wont be as high as the pizza stand
option, but it does still offer a bit of storage space underneath the panel.

The Set

27

Working with Wood

In two of these stage designs, I mention doing a bit of woodworking. If you arent the
woodworking sort, dont panic! These are in no way complex builds and are easy to
achieve even if you dont own any truly dangerous tools, but there are three things you
should know before you get started:
Wood doesnt have to be expensiveHigh-quality wood is expensive, but for
our purposes a cheap piece of wood called a furring strip is perfect. They
generally cost $2-$4 for an 8 length of wood (the width varies). Ask someone
at the store where they are and then paw through the pile for one that suits your
needs. Make sure you get one that isnt treated with chemicalsraw wood is your
friend, and it can be stained if you want to go the extra mile.
Lumber sizes are not exactIts an oddity of the lumber industry, but a 4 wide
piece of wood is usually 3.5 or 3.75 inches wide, but it is sold as 4 wide.
And even if the stated measurements are accurate, cutting will change the length.
A board thats 8 (96) long cant be cut it into four 2 sections because the saw
blade is about 1/8 wideyou lose about 1/2 from the overall length of the
board, if not more. If you arent cutting it yourself, ask whoever is to cut it to length,
but overall to make sure the pieces are equal. Its better to have two 1 11 boards
than two boards of different lengths.
Hardware stores can make cuts for youMany hardware stores have a saw
sitting around in the back and will make simple cuts for you. Usually this is free,
but sometimes they charge a small fee to avoid having to cut complex projects.
They can only make simple cuts (like turning an 8 board into four pieces or cutting
a 2x4 panel into two 2x2 panels) and sometimes youre better off marking off
your cuts with a pencil and ruler before asking them to fire up the saw. Make sure
to describe exactly what your end goal is to the person doing the cutting. (Also,
a word of general advice: Be nice to the person who is trained in the use of
industrial-grade powered cutting tools.)

Challenge - Achievement: Set Designer

1. Put a central, focusing element into the game space that fits the theme of
your game, and encourage your players to interact with it if possible.
2. Put on your assistant director hat and compact all your GMing materials so
they fit into a small storage container.

3. Find three props that fit the theme of your game and introduce them into
the central area at different times during the night (whenever there are
significant scene changes).

4. Build a raised set or create a box theater for your next game that uses
miniatures.

5. Institute a kipple reduction plan as a rule for your game, and reward your
players with an in-game benefit for following the rule.

28

6. Sit back and look at your table for a few minutes. Write down three things
you could add to your setup that would improve it or remove distractions.
Chapter 2

Getting Foam
Polystyrene foam is available from most big-box hardware stores and can be
found in the insulation aisle. It is sold in varying thicknesses and width/height
combinations. You can also find it in old coolers and packing material from
shipping boxes, but these sources wont usually yield nice big sheets that are easy
to cut. Hunt around to find the cheapest ones you can and avoid foam that bills
itself as having been treated with special chemicals.

Cutting Foam
Polystyrene foam cuts well with a serrated knife, such as a cheap kitchen steak
knife or a large bread knifethe kind you can acquire from any thrift store. Some
people use hot wire cutters to carve out shapes, but Ive found serrated knives often
work best. If you want to use a power tool for the job, an electric kitchen knife can
save your wrist from some pain if youre cutting large sections of foam. Ive also been
known to use my scroll saw to cut out large shapes when making big props, but I usually default back to the kitchen bread knife.
Getting smooth cuts in polystyrene can sometimes be difficult, but its usually just a
matter of pressure and a steady hand. Waxing the sides of your knife can help it move
through the foam smoothly. If you want to smooth or sand the foam, get a piece
of scrap foam and rub the smoothest edge you can find against the area you want to
smooth. A slightly damp cloth can also work well to clean rough edges.

Shaping and Joining

Polystyrene foam can be stacked to
create terrain that rises high and covers a large area. You can join foam
pieces with wood glue and use toothpicks to hold it together while it dries.
You can build square or angled buildings by cutting the foam and connecting pieces together to form walls and
a ceiling. Foam pieces that have been
stacked high can be carved as if they
were a single piece to create a tall prop
with a specific shape (e.g., a mountain).

Using Foam Board

A custom Foam Board bunker with wire

ladder and blue foam turned into terrain
make a cheap but impressive scene.

Many pieces of wargaming terrain incorporate foam board to create smooth structures or additions to more rocky pieces of terrain. Depending on what you are making, using a piece of foam board will provide a thinner piece of foam with a paper
coating on each side. This paper can be peeled off of one side to provide a foam-like
surface (wet it first for an easier time). Foam board crafts much like cardboard, but
cutting it is best done with a box cutter or a rotary tool.
The Props Master

51

Artist: Avery Liell-Kok

77

Artist: Matt Morrow

Why Is Having a Good Shooting Script Important?

A script provides the blueprint youll use to guide your players through the game
session. Guide doesnt have to mean railroad, and script is just the term that
fits the movie metaphor were using throughout Focal Point. For our purposes, even
if you walk into a session with no adventure notes whatsoever, theres a scriptor
something like oneinvolved in some way.
Scripts come in all shapes and sizes, from highly detailed pre-packaged adventures
to broad outlines (like the ones in Engine Publishings EUREKA: 501 Adventure Plots
to Inspire Game Masters) to hastily scribbled notes to simply winging it. All of these
are valid scripts and whether they work for a particular GM is a matter of taste.
Whether a script is a good shooting script is another matter. A good shooting script
should have the following elements.

It works within the boundaries of your campaign.

It holds together and lacks obvious plot holes or exploitable plot elements.

80

It interests the PCs.

It suits the PCs and has appropriate challenges.

Chapter 7

House Rule Assumptions

While you shouldnt usually need to put common mechanics on a rules cheat sheet,
be sure to refresh your memory on how they work from time to time anyway. It always
amazes me when I discover that my gaming group as a whole interprets a rule a certain
way that is clearly wrong and has been doing so for quite some time. It can come as
quite a shock when they learn that theyve been doing it wrong.
When this happens, be prepared for some resistance. Often these unofficial house rule
assumptions get started because theres a clear advantage for the PCs, and they may
have relied on this advantage when designing or upgrading their characters. In these
cases its entirely up to you whether to enforce the original rule, but if you do then you
should give your players some leeway in adjusting their PCs accordingly.

StoryboardingDesigning a Flowchart
In fi lm, storyboards are essentially comic books that illustrate how scenes should
play out. They enable directors and others involved in the fi lms production to understand whats supposed to happen during a shoot. You cant apply this concept to
gaming in its entirety because of the unpredictability of player actionsand other
thingsthat can, and usually do, send sessions off in unexpected directions.
What you can take from storyboarding is the element of mapping out likely paths
for the PCs. This gives you an idea of what you need to prepare (and which rules to
highlight on your cheat sheet). To create a flowchart, simply map the decision points
that you expect your players to make during the session and then draw lines to the
next scene based on each decision.
A session flowchart is very similar to a dungeon map: On a dungeon map, each door
and corridor on the map represents a decision point; on a flowchart, the scenes are
the decision points. If the PCs entered Room 5 and there is a door to their left and
another in front of them, chances are that their next moves will be to explore whats
behind each door and then make a decision as to which one to go through. You can
make similar guesses about what theyll do next on a flowchart.
Figure B1 provides an example flowchart for a supers campaign. In the last session,
the PCs discovered an alien attack on a government research facility and they forced
the aliens to flee. For todays session, the GM knows the starting point (the aliens
fl ight) and the likely endpoint, getting inside the alien mother ship.
While brainstorming the flowchart, the GM anticipates that the PCs will pursue the
aliens, but its also possible that the PCs will let the aliens go for now and try to figure
out what attracted them to the facility. Shes listed both options on the flowchart.

98

Chapter 8

Figure B1

START
Aliens are
fleeing facility

Yes

No

Pursue?

Investigate
whats important
at the facility

Space Chase

Mothership
Defenses

Interview staff

Poke around

Uncover alien
ship held in
secret hangar

Into the
Mothership
Yes

FINISH
Seek help
accessing
computer

Access
computer?
No

Following the flowchart gets the PCs to the mothership one way or another. They
may do this by directly pursuing the aliens or by discovering an alien ship inside the
facility that is transmitting a beacon. If the PCs break off their pursuit, then they may
still get the information they need by going back to the facility. Simply following the
flowchart gets the PCs to the session goal.
Lets take a deeper look at two things about Figure B1. First, the flowchart can also
highlight the rules needed for the session. Theres obviously going to be some combat,
but if the PCs directly pursue the aliens then chase rules may be involved. Investigating the facility requires skill checks and social interaction, as well as possibly tapping
a computer-specialist contact. Youll want to note page numbers on the rules cheat
sheet (or even just jot them down on the flowchart).
Preparing the Shoot

99

Breaking Thought Fatigue

Artist: Matt Morrow

One of the problems with not having a break is that it can lead to tunnel vision or
thought fatigue, which is when the players get tired and simply dont consider alternatives beyond their initial impulses. They may race through a dungeon without
considering traps or secret doors, they may decide to attack anyone who gets in their
way, or they may continually beat a red herring into the ground because they know
that its the solution to the mystery.
Thought fatigue is compounded when the players are feeling frustrated. Whether the
dice seem to be against them, their attempts to follow a clue turn up nothing but red
herrings, or the Big Bad just seems undefeatable, the players start to feel as though
nothing they can do will overcome their problem. In this case, a quick break may be
all they need to recharge their creative energies. (Another option is to offer clues to
overcome the problem, but frustrated players tend to see this as a cheatand it does
little to end the fatigue).

Evaluating Your Shooting Schedule

Breaks are a good time to evaluate your session goal. If your break is in the middle
of the session, is your group about where you expected to be by now? If not, then you
may need to amend your session goal and ensure that the new goal offers a suitable
ending spot to keep your players wanting more.

134

Chapter 11

Fatigue
There are times when physical factors like hunger, lack of sleep, mental stress, or the
onset of an illness can cause a persons focus to waver. A person who is feeling fatigue
is not going to have the same mental acuity as someone who is relaxed and well rested.
In times like these, Taking a Break or Calling It are the best ways to regain focus.

Story Pace and Flow

Often players start to disengage when the story bogs down, and this can usually be
traced back to you, the GM, or what you prepped for the session. Its possible that
youve created a problem thats too difficult to solve or stymied an investigation by
allowing players to fail a check for a key clue. Or you may have presented a situation
that requires extensive player planning, which always slows down the pace of the
game.
When a story is well-paced and interesting it commands our attention, even to the
point of shutting out everything around us. Weve all had those moments in a game
where we stop seeing the players and just see their characters. When a story goes too
slow or it fails to engage us emotionally we become hyper-aware of everything else
around us and distractions come out of the woodwork.
If you realize that the story is plodding along, then you need to make some corrections to speed it back up to recapture your players attention. Consider Ninjas Bust
Th rough the Door to add an element of unexpected action, or Fast Forward Button
to speed up the conclusion of the current scene and get into the next (and hopefully
more interesting) scene.

Moving the Spotlight Around

Its unrealistic to think that every scene can put the spotlight on every character.
More often than not what winds up happening is that the spotlight gets stuck on a
single PC because of the way the scene developedwhich is great for you and that
player, but leaves everyone else out.
While players will stay focused on the game when theyre not in the spotlight, they
usually wont do so indefinitely. If you lose focus and get caught up in a scene, or if
an individual scene is followed by more individual scenes, eventually virtually every
players attention will drift. After all, theyre not called watcherstheyre called
players, and theyre here to play.
When you are running scenes where the spotlight is on one player, or just a portion of
the group, you need to aggressively move the spotlight around from player to player.
This will often require you to juggle several mini-scenes at the same time. Run one
scene until you can find a logical gap and then quickly cut to the next player, and
the next, until you have come around back to the first player. Do this until you have
resolved all the mini-scenes and you can return the group into a single scene.

160

Chapter 14

Creating Safety
The majority of the time, safety is compromised by accident. This means that
we can mitigate the chances of someone being made to feel unsafe with a bit of
forethought and planning. This planning often involves establishing boundaries
so that everyone knows the comfort zones of each player as well as the acceptable tone and actions within the group. Once those zones have been discussed
there are also ways to help to maintain them during play.

Understanding Comfort Zones

It is important for each player to define, or at least understand, his or her comfort zones. These zones encompass our reactions to different topics and situations that
we encounter. Everyone has three basic comfort zones:

ComfortableThese are things that we can see, discuss, and experience

without feeling unsafe. Were fine with these being played out at the table.

UncomfortableThese are things that we can see, discuss, and experience,

but only in limited amounts or when not described in detail. Taken too far,
these things will make us feel unsafe.
ForbiddenThese are topics which make us feel unsafe no matter how
they arise or how lightly theyre present in the game.

These three categories will be different for each person at the table. One player might
be uncomfortable with a plot that involves the children in harms way, while another
may consider that topic forbidden. Its important to discover and understand what
topics are forbidden and uncomfortable for you and your players, and doing so is
much easier than trying to list every topic with which people are comfortable.

Social Contract
The best way to establish comfort zones is to incorporate them into your groups social
contract. Social contracts are a big topic and are outside the scope of this chapter,
but in a nutshell a social contract is a written or unwritten understanding among
the people in your group about conduct during gaming sessions. (Search for social
contract on gnomestew.com, as well as other gaming sites, for much more information
on this topic.)
As part of your social contract, create a list of the topics that are uncomfortable and
forbidden for each person in your group. Its entirely possible that the same topic will
fall into a different comfort zone for different people. If this happens, assign those
topics to the most sensitive zonefor example, if a topic is comfortable for one player
and uncomfortable for another, it gets flagged as uncomfortable for the group.
The resulting list will establish a set of boundaries for your group at the gaming
table. For you, the GM, it also acts as a list of which topics are acceptable to include
in adventures (comfortable), which ones you need to pay extra care and attention to
when they come up (uncomfortable), and which ones to avoid entirely (forbidden).
Safety on the Set

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Reaching a Collaborative State

When a group has the right attitude, a sense of teamwork, and good communication,
it can reach that collaborative state where the sum of their ideas is greater than any
individual idea. This collaborative state has three hallmarks.

Ideas are Built

A collaborative effort is one where an idea is built from a collection of smaller ideas.
Its not collaboration when one person proposes an idea and the group agrees with
him. Rather, in collaboration, someone poses an imperfect idea and others add their
ideas to address the imperfections by using their expertise, experiences, and knowledge. The group then combines those ideas into a final idea thats stronger than the
original idea.

There are No Stars

A collaborative group strives to be as inclusive as possible. When they build an idea or
come up with a solution, they do so to utilize the skills of everyone in the group, not
to rally behind one person, so that everyone has a chance to contribute and to share in
its success and rewards. For example, in a fantasy game where the partys wizard and
thief can both get past a locked door (the wizard by using a spell, the thief with lock
picks), the group would decide to have the thief pick the lock and reserve the wizards
spell for later in the session, enabling both characters to shine.

Being Collaborative at the Table

Apart from being a good life skill, the ability to collaborate also has a direct impact
on the game. There are many times during a session where the PCs will need to collaborate, and in order for that to happen the players have to be able to collaborate.
Here are three common examples:

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CombatIn any life-and-death struggle, a group whose members have

each others backs will fair far better than a group of hot shots each going
it alone. Players skilled at collaboration look out for each other, understand
everyones strengths and weaknesses, and know how to combine their
strengths to defeat the toughest foes. Groups that cant pull together wind
up getting picked off one at time when they get in over their heads. The
greatest challenge to collaboration in combat is when characters try to
showboat and take on the biggest threats solo, rather than combining their
abilities with the rest of the party.
Heists and ambushesScenes where the group needs to come up with
and then execute a plan are natural opportunities for collaboration. In
these types of scenes the players need to combine their ideas to overcome
a challenge that is greater than any one of them can accomplish on their
own. The tricky part is including as many members of the party as possible
so that no one feels left out.
Chapter 16

Rules Lawyer Becomes Rules Expert

As I mentioned in the previous chapter, Im not the best at learning and memorizing crunchy game rules. They just dont stick well with me. I am blessed
because I always game with someone who is a rules savant, who has a wonderful
grasp of the core mechanics as well as a large number of ancillary rules. In the
past I would struggle to study the rules over and over to gain mastery over them
so that I could make sure that the players were not trying to skirt any rules, and
that we were playing properly. I would also shut down the player who knew the
rules well, labeling them as a rules lawyer, when they noted things that I was
doing wrong.
Theres a limit to how well you can know the rules, though, and to how much time
you can devote to rules mastery alongside all of your other GMing duties. So instead
of taking offense at a rules lawyer, put them to work for you. Make them the czar of
the rules, the oracle that everyone in the group can turn to when they need to know
something about how the game system works. Establish that if someone breaks a rule
(likely unintentionally), the rules expert will politely mention it so that the rule can
be followed correctly.

Artist: Elizabeth Porter

Film Crew

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